


He'll Probably Be Fine

by LostCol



Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Genre: 4x05 Gap Filler, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Gap Filler, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-27
Updated: 2020-03-27
Packaged: 2021-03-01 00:21:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23336044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LostCol/pseuds/LostCol
Summary: 4x05 gap filler. (With some S2 gap filler reminiscences thrown in.) The night Justin confronts Hobbs, Brian’s at the loft spiraling.
Relationships: Brian Kinney/Justin Taylor (Queer as Folk)
Comments: 18
Kudos: 52





	He'll Probably Be Fine

**Author's Note:**

> So Brian's penchant for being a melodramatic drama queen definitely comes out in this, and fair warning, his terrified imaginings are a bit graphic for a paragraph or so... Enjoy!

I should have stopped him. I should have fucking stopped him. _FUCK._

I have no idea where he is, or what he’s doing, or if he’s even fucking alive, and here I am, lying in bed, smoking a joint, trying to calm my nerves the fuck down.

Because what the fuck else can I do?

I didn’t stop him. I didn’t follow him. I have no fucking idea where Hobbs lives.

And anyway, he’ll probably be fine.

He’s gone to confront the fucking psychopath that tried to beat him to death in front of me, with the everlasting support of that fucking psycho Cody, with a fucking _gun_.

But he’ll probably be fine.

I’m sure he’s not lying in the dirt with a bullet in his stomach, bleeding out but still conscious enough to know that he’s dying, alone, in the dark, on the cold ground. Scared out of his fucking mind. Pressing his shaking hand to his stomach to try to stop the blood that’s pouring out, even though he’s almost blacking out from the pain of pushing on the bullet wound. Maybe desperately scrambling for his phone with his other hand to call 911, to call me, to call fucking _anyone_ so there’s at least a human voice on the line when he dies.

That’s probably not happening.

Jesus fucking Christ.

My hand is shaking when I bring the joint to my lips, and I figure I might as well save the rest for later. It’s doing absofuckinglutely nothing for my raging anxiety.

I zone out for a while, meditating on the image of Justin bleeding to death in a ditch, his skin glowing in the moonlight, until I’m jolted back to awareness by the clanging of the elevator. I look at the clock – 12:38 am – and let myself hope that it’s him. Alive and, well, if not exactly _well_ , at least not irreparably damaged.

And then I hear the key in the door.

I'd thought I'd jump up and meet him at the door like a goddamn muncher, get my hands on him and never fucking let go. But now that the moment's here… I'm frozen, and I don't know why.

I'm _so fucking glad_ that he's home, I'm so fucking relieved that he's safe, but it's like... it's like it's too much, like there are too many emotions rushing through my body, frying my brain, and I can't move, or think. So I lie here, staring at the ceiling as I listen to him slide the heavy metal door open and closed, lock it, kick off his shoes, toss his jacket on the couch – I’ve given up the dream that he'll ever fucking hang it up – and turn off the lights over the kitchen counter that I'd optimistically – okay, _desperately_ – left on for him.

I watch his shape as he moves around the dark loft and take note of his movements – normal – and his breathing – a little loud. Is he hurt? Or anxious? We’ve been fighting the whole goddamn time he’s been on his little vigilante mission, so between that and our screaming match when I found the gun – a fucking _gun_ , this fucking idiot – he knows exactly how pissed I am about what he’s been doing.

And scared, yeah, I know the perceptive fucker knows I’ve been scared out of my mind, but I know for certain that he doesn’t grasp the depth of that terror. How could he? _He_ didn’t watch himself get his head cracked open and almost bleed to death on that cold cement floor. _He_ didn’t hold his hand and talk to him the whole fucking ambulance ride because the paramedics said your voice might comfort him, even though you knew he was too far gone for it to make any goddamn difference.

How could he know that’s the scene that’s been playing over and over again in my nightmares, waking me up in a cold sweat every few weeks for the past two fucking years?

He doesn’t know, because I can’t tell him that.

The little crusader comes lightly up the steps into the bedroom, obviously making an effort to be quiet, not sure if I’m awake.

_OF COURSE I’M STILL FUCKING AWAKE_ , I want to scream.

I turn my head toward him, and I know the blue light above the bed is enough for him to see that my eyes are open.

He smiles.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

I pull back the covers for him while he strips, dropping his clothes in a heap on the floor. He climbs into bed and wriggles over to my side, laying half on top of me along the length of my body, nudging his knee between my legs and resting his head on my shoulder. He bumps his forehead lightly against my jaw and squeezes me tight, and I’m so fucking relieved that he’s here, he’s safe, he’s in my arms, that I squeeze right back, letting out a long breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. To my utter embarrassment, it’s a very shaky exhale, and I know instantly that Justin notices when he tilts his head up to kiss my jaw, and starts tracing light circles on my chest to calm me down.

So, a little background here. A few months after the bashing, after we’d endured weeks of panic attacks, nightmares, loft-destroying rages, pretty much the full PTSD/TBI repertoire, I finally hit on a reliable way to calm down our not-so-sunny Sunshine. The rages weren’t nearly as frequent as the panic attacks and nightmares, but they were more heartbreaking, because the kid doesn’t have a naturally violent bone in his body.

Bitchy and dramatic, yes. Violent, no.

I walked into the loft one afternoon a few months in, and I knew something was wrong before I even saw him. It’s impossible to explain, but I felt this manic energy wash over me the second I stepped over the threshold.

Then I heard the ripping.

Then I saw his face.

It was red and splotchy and his eyes were puffy, and his cheeks were wet with tears, but he didn’t look angry, just… despondent.

And he was tearing up his drawings.

He screamed at me when I dropped my briefcase and started toward him, and when he turned to get away from me, I wrapped my arms around him from behind, holding him in the tightest bear hug I could manage without squeezing so hard he couldn’t breathe – a surefire way to bring on a panic attack – until he stopped fighting.

He put up a decent fight, but when his adrenaline ran out and he finally stopped yelling and struggling and leaned back heavily against me, he was still breathing fast enough that I was nervous he’d start hyperventilating. I went with my (inexplicable) instincts and slipped my hand up his t-shirt to rub slow, firm circles on his chest. And fuck if he didn’t lean his head back on my shoulder and immediately start working to slow down his shuddering, gasping breathing.

A couple nights later, I jolted awake to him sitting bolt upright in bed, wild eyed, sweating, shaking, and hyperventilating his way out of his third knock down drag out nightmare of the week. And I figured, if it worked once…

See, one of my biggest fears in these moments is that Justin will accidentally hurt himself, in a fit of rage or despair. He’s sure as hell not careful when he’s flying to pieces like that, and I’ve watched him stumble, and trip, and whack his arm on a doorframe, and, well, you get the idea. And I worry that he’ll make himself actually, physically sick from the panic. Or, and I can barely even stand to think about this, that he won’t be able to pull himself back one time and he’ll descend into a full-blow mental breakdown. So finding a relatively fast, reliable way of calming him down had been at the front of my mind since he’d moved in.

So, back to the nightmare.

I shifted behind him and pulled him back between my legs, rubbing circles on his heaving chest and breathing deeply, murmuring in his ear that he should try to match his breathing to mine. After a few panicked minutes, he leaned his head back against my shoulder and sucked in deep, shaky breaths. His breathing slowed and the shaking faded, and in record time he slumped heavily against me, making his little half-asleep sighs and whimpers that I will never fucking tell him are cute as hell, before dropping off back to sleep. I shifted us so that we were lying down and pulled him onto my chest, and I traced light circles on his back until I fell asleep.

And there it was, a surefire way to calm Sunshine down. Works almost every time.

Well, like 70% of the time.

And here the kid is tonight, sensing my anxiety, and stealing my own trick to calm me down.

While he continues tracing circles on my chest, I trace my fingers up and down his arm and savor the feeling of his heart beating against my chest. I’m contemplating how to stop his suicidal vigilantism without falling into another screaming match – because that obviously doesn’t fucking work when he’s pissed as hell and bloodthirsty for justice, and because it feels so goddamn wrong to scream at the kid when all I want to do is lock him up in the loft and protect him from the world – when he says it.

And the cynical side of me, which, fair enough, is most of me, is sure I misheard, or misunderstood.

“What?”

“It’s over. It’s done. I’m done.”

Now, I’d forgive you for thinking, _oh thank Christ_. _The relief that must be flooding through this bastard right now…_ And yes, there is that. But the worst-case scenario part of my brain hasn’t completely calmed down yet, and it gives me a very unwelcome flash of a panicked Justin bleeding out in a ditch.

“What happened?” My voice is rougher than I intend it to be.

“What?”

“What happened? Jesus, Justin.” I pull him out of bed bodily – “Brian! What the—" and grab his arm, switching on the lights as I haul him into the bathroom.

“Brian, what are you doing?”

_That’s fucking obvious_ , I think, as I look him up and down, lifting one arm and then the other by his wrists, pushing gently on his shoulders to turn him around to examine his back. Has he forgotten the massive fucking bruise he got the first goddamn week he went out ‘patrolling’?

He sighs, but he lets me move him around while I inspect him.

“Brian, I’m fine.”

I ignore him, running my hands lightly up and down his arms and back before giving his shoulders a squeeze and sliding my hands across his chest, hugging him from behind. His skin is warm and soft and he smells so fucking good, and when I grip him tighter, he rubs my arm gently and says again, softer, “Brian, I’m fine.”

I let him lead me back to bed, switching off the lights on the way, and we lay down facing each other.

“So, what happened?”

I say it softly, but I need him to answer. I need to know how done he really is, and whether something really fucking bad happened. He’s so fucking smart, but he’s been _so_ angry, and I know the kinds of mistakes angry, scared twenty-year-olds make. Especially when they’re being egged on by a fucking psychopath.

He sighs again and looks down, and I know he knows I won’t like what he’s going to say, but he meets my eyes before answering.

“We went to see Hobbs. At his house.”

SHIT.

“He said some shit, so I threatened him. And…”

“… And?”

He sighs again, “and then I put the gun in his mouth while Cody screamed at me to pull the trigger. Hobbs pissed his pants.”

_Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck._ I don’t even think I’m breathing.

“And then?”

“And then I told Hobbs to go inside. I gave Cody the gun, and I left. I’d done what I needed to, I guess.”

_Christ._

“Made Hobbs feel as scared and helpless as he made you feel?”

“Yeah, I guess. I don’t know. I don’t feel… I don’t feel angry like I did.”

“Oh, were you angry?” I ask lightly, and he smiles a little.

“Asshole.”

“Yeah well, no shit. You screamed at me enough times,” but I’m smiling when I say it. I don’t even give a shit about the arguing; I’m just so fucking relieved that it’s over.

“And… fuck, you were right, Brian.”

“Always am. But about what, specifically?”

“We were taking it too far. We shouldn’t have gone out looking for trouble. I was just… I just needed to do _something_.”

And fuck, I know how that feels.

“I guess I needed to make Hobbs piss his pants.”

“I guess so.”

We just look at each other for a while, relief flooding through both of us.

I’m not naïve enough to think that he’s all fixed up and cured now, but that’s okay. We have time to work on that. For now, it’s enough that he’s done running headlong toward trouble. That I no longer feel like he’s being slowly pulled away from me.

Eventually, he cups my cheek in his hand and runs his thumb across my cheekbone, smiling a little. I smile back and pull him to me, and we wrap our arms around each other and tangle our legs together. I run my fingers through his hair as we both drift toward sleep, and I tighten my arms around him when I feel him burrow into me, making the little sighs and whimpers he always makes – and thank Christ, will continue making – right on the point of falling asleep.

He’ll be just fine.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are always appreciated!


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